


There We Two

by Dragonflies_and_Katydids



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, Growing Old Together, M/M, So Married, also so fluffy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-31
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-12-09 08:07:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11665071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dragonflies_and_Katydids/pseuds/Dragonflies_and_Katydids
Summary: For the prompt, "Saemus/Ashaad where they survive DA2 and live far away happily away from Kirkwall."(I'm sorry, I tried to fit in some smut, but it didn't quite work.)





	There We Two

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DrowsyRaconteur](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DrowsyRaconteur/gifts).



> A glimpse through an interstice caught,  
> Of a crowd of workmen and drivers in a bar-room around the stove late of a winter night, and I unremark’d seated in a corner,  
> Of a youth who loves me and whom I love, silently approaching and seating himself near, that he may hold me by the hand,  
> A long while amid the noises of coming and going, of drinking and oath and smutty jest,  
> There we two, content, happy in being together, speaking little, perhaps not a word.
> 
> Walt Whitman

The Qun has never concerned itself with happiness.

Ashaad never questioned that when he was younger. Asking why he wasn't allowed to be happy would have been akin to asking why he wasn't allowed to fly. It was simply the way of the world. Contentment was acceptable, so long as it was contentment in the role the tamassrans assigned, but happiness was irrelevant at best and dangerous at worst. Happiness is a personal thing, and thus nothing but a kind of selfishness. To seek happiness was to value self above the Qun.

It's been a long time since Ashaad followed the Qun, but he thinks about it now, standing on Val Chevin's docks and staring down into the water. All around, people give him a wide berth, careful not to bump him even in this crowd, but he's so accustomed by now to their sideways looks that he hardly notices. He watches the water instead, the way it laps at the wooden pilings, and his lips form words he hasn't said aloud in a very long time.

"Meraad astaarit, meraad itwasit, aban aqun." _The tide rises, the tide falls, but the sea is changeless._

He's spent weeks and months on the sea by now, has sweated under a windless sky and ridden out storms he was sure would kill them all. He's climbed the rigging of a hundred ships and watched the sea pass by, blues and greens and browns in more shades than he can name. He's seen it black in the moonlight, and silver-grey in the dawn, and tipped with flame at sunset.

The Qun taught him that the sea is changeless, but Ashaad has learned better. The sea changes constantly. The sea _is_ change.

"Do you want the berths or not?" an impatient voice asks.

Ashaad comes back to the present and looks at the captain with an emotionless face. Many people find that blankness disturbing, and this captain is no exception: his feet shift in an obvious display of nerves, and he licks his lips, not quite willing to meet Ashaad's eyes as he adds, "I have a lot to do before tomorrow morning." His voice is quieter now, his tone apologetic.

"We will take them," Ashaad says, hoping he won't regret it.

But this is the only ship to Dairsmuid that's come through Val Chevin in a month, and they're running out of time. If they don't take this one, or if someone else claims the only two berths available while Ashaad hesitates, then he and Saemus will have no choice but to make their way west in a series of small hops from port to port. A painfully slow way to travel, and Saemus was hoping to reach Dairsmuid with a few weeks to spare, to give them time to settle in to their new home.

So Ashaad reaches into his belt pouch and counts out half of the price that the captain quoted him. Why do so many humans think qunari are too stupid to know when they're being cheated?

The captain opens his mouth when Ashaad hands over the coins, then thinks better of whatever argument he'd been about to make and says instead, a bit sulkily, "If you're not aboard when the tide is right, we won't wait for you."

 _Meraad astaarit, meraad itwasit._ Words every sailor understands, even ones who've never heard of the Qun.

It makes Ashaad smile inside as he heads back up the dock, stretching out his legs to cover the distance more quickly. He's been gone longer than he meant, and Saemus is sometimes inattentive. If he finds a new story to write down or a good view to sketch, he could be knocked over the head and never see it coming. Val Chevin is far from the most dangerous place they've visited, but the docks are not the safest part of any city.

Sure enough, when Ashaad finds him, Saemus is seated on a barrel with his latest journal open on his knees. His eyes go from the page to the scene in front of him, paying no mind to the people around him as he sketches the harbor in quick, efficient lines. Unlike Ashaad, no one gives Saemus any extra space, but if the constant jostling bothers him, his smile doesn't show it.

A smile that broadens when he sees Ashaad, and he hops down from his perch with the book still open in his hands. "Success?" he asks.

With thoughts of the past so close to the surface, Ashaad finds himself studying Saemus's face, marking the little signs of the years between then and now. The pale skin that burned so easily in their first days out from Kirkwall has tanned, weathered by sun and wind. His black hair is half grey, and there are permanent lines at the corners of his mouth and eyes. Changes Ashaad barely noticed as they happened, time creeping in to leave its mark.

The eyes are the same, though, that shocking blue of the ocean around Seheron. And the smile may have changed, but only for the better: it's confident now, quick to light his face the way it never was when they met.

That smile is fading into concern now, and Ashaad says hastily, "Success. They sail with the morning tide."

The concern remains, blue eyes narrowing. "And?"

Another change, that ability to read him. Sometimes Ashaad hates it, but the information he's holding back is something he would have had to share sooner or later. "They plan to resupply in Kirkwall."

Saemus blinks, surprised. "Kirkwall." He shuts the book and tucks it under his arm, reaching out to touch Ashaad's arm. "We can find another ship, if you'd rather."

"If _I'd_ rather?" Ashaad asks, perplexed.

"There'll be another, sooner or later," Saemus says, as if he's reassuring Ashaad. "Or we can sail to Val Royeaux first. Though we might be better off just staying here and waiting, rather than lose the time backtracking." He frowns thoughtfully. "Or perhaps Amaranthine? That's close enough, surely we can-"

"Saemus," Ashaad interrupts, a laugh bubbling up in his chest as understanding dawns. "Kirkwall means nothing to _me_."

Saemus's mouth forms a small oh, and then he smiles again, so sweetly Ashaad wants to scandalize any onlookers and kiss him right here in the middle of Val Chevin's docks. Saemus wouldn't care, but some lessons of the Qun are too much a part of Ashaad to ever leave behind completely, and so he keeps his hands to himself.

"You think Kirkwall means something to me?" Saemus asks. A little baffled, perhaps, but nothing more. The unhappiness Ashaad was afraid of seeing on his face is noticeably absent. "We left thirty-five _years_ ago."

"If it means nothing, why have we never stopped there?"

Saemus looks down at his hand on Ashaad's arm, and his fingers stroke lightly over the skin. "It meant something once," he allows. "Maybe for longer than it should have. And then you never mentioned it, so I thought..." He shakes his head, laughing softly. "Never mind what I thought. I never bothered to ask, when there were so many other places to see."

More true than Ashaad would have credited when he was younger. Sometimes he thinks they've walked through every major city in Thedas, and most of the minor ones. By now, Saemus's journals are the only way Ashaad can keep everything straight, though Saemus himself seems to remember all of it, back alleys and palaces alike.

"So," Saemus says, drawing the word out. "Kirkwall."

"Kirkwall."

Saemus's smile changes, becomes thoughtful in a way Ashaad knows very well. "I haven't written a book about Kirkwall yet."

"Resupply," Ashaad says firmly. "The ship stops only long enough to resupply."

"And we're expected in Dairsmuid by the end of summer, yes, I know." Saemus squints out to sea as if weighing the odds of finding another ship in Kirkwall that can take them as far as Dairsmuid by autumn.

Before Ashaad can say anything about the risks of such a plan, Saemus shrugs the whole question aside and says, "Perhaps next year. Surely the university will give me a few weeks, if I tell them it's for another book."

"A few weeks?" Ashaad asks skeptically. "More like a few months."

Saemus grins up at him slyly. "Months are made of weeks."

Ashaad smiles despite himself as he turns them in the direction of the inn where they've stayed while they waited for a ship. It's a good inn, even if most of the patrons are unsure what to make of a qunari. Something they won't have to tolerate in Rivain, and Ashaad knows Saemus considered that when he agreed to take the position with the university in Dairsmuid. Other universities have made more attractive offers over the years and would make those offers again if Saemus were to so much as whisper that he might be interested.

At least, those offers were more attractive in terms of money and prestige, but Dairsmuid will treat Ashaad very differently than Val Royeaux and Minrathous. When the first letter arrived, Saemus made it clear which of those mattered more to him, that he wouldn't be happy in a place where Ashaad was always treated as less.

"Why would I want to do something that will make me unhappy?" Saemus had said, laughing as he tossed the letter into the fire.

And the Qun would say that this is selfish.

Those thoughts are too weighty for their last night on land, though, and Ashaad sets them aside. Better to enjoy an excellent meal and the fine feather bed that fits even his considerable height.

Far better to enjoy the smile Saemus gives him as they undress, the way he steps closer and asks a familiar question with a kiss instead of with words. Ashaad answers him in kind, bending down even though his back and knees are getting too old for such things. One thing the Qun taught him that he still holds close: some things are worth a little pain.

Saemus pulls away and rolls his eyes. "Sit, for the love of the Maker." Because he knows every twinge that pulls Ashaad up short, all the pains that grip his bones. It's why they leave for Dairsmuid tomorrow morning: it's someplace where Ashaad might ache a little less and where Saemus can turn more of his journals into books. Someplace quiet and slow, after all the noise and haste of the last thirty-five years.

Thirty-five years, and even with Saemus sliding off the last of his clothes, Ashaad's thoughts catch on that. Thirty-five years of wandering through deserts, and forests, and cities great and small. Thirty-five years of gathering stories from illiterate Chasind and royal archivists, from every person Saemus could convince to hold still long enough. Thirty-five years of the sea and seemingly-endless roads, of sleeping under bushes in sweltering heat and freezing cold and driving rain.

Only thirty years of this, though: Saemus's mouth on his, and Saemus's hands stroking over his skin, and Saemus's body under his hands. Familiar and easy, paths he knows by heart and yet which feel new every time. The years since they left Kirkwall seem like an age. The years since Saemus first kissed him seem like nothing at all.

"You're thinking too much," Saemus says, laughing. The reminder has long since become a joke between them; for all Saemus is the scholar, Ashaad is the one more likely to end up lost in his own head.

"A bad habit," Ashaad murmurs. He touches Saemus's cheek, traces the lines at the corner of one eye. "Especially when the world holds so many wonders."

Words Saemus has said to him a hundred times, but Ashaad isn't thinking about Nevarran pyramids or the crescent moon rising above the steppes in the Anderfels.

Saemus smiles, that same sweet smile he gave on the docks this afternoon, and this time, Ashaad kisses him. Lets go of yesterday and tomorrow in favor of tonight: Saemus's skin against his and Saemus's voice breathing _yes_ and _oh_ and _please_ into his ear as they move together.

In the quiet that follows after, Saemus stretched out beside him, Ashaad lingers on the edge of sleep and thinks again about the past and the future. Thirty years since he left the Qun to follow Saemus instead, and tomorrow he'll follow Saemus again, to somewhere they can both be happy.

Whatever else the tamassrans knew, they knew nothing of this.


End file.
